Lynda Robinson: Murder at the Feast of Rejoicing

"Explain."

"You know how much she loves writing and ciphering. She spends too much time with the steward and his scribes."

His steward, Kasa, managed the fields of Baht, its tenants and laborers, and the production of commodities upon which the manor survived. He'd been in charge since before their father died. His two sons had been trained to follow him.

"One of Kasa's sons?"

Idut shook her head. "An apprentice scribe, Nu."

"I don't remember this Nu." His head was beginning to ache.

"He's the grandson of your old nurse."

"Are you sure, Idut?"

"They spend hours together every day in the steward's office."

"But that's all?" he asked.

"You know what it's like to be in love fever, Meren. Who knows if that's all?"

He gazed out over the blue surface of the water. Fish shimmered beneath its surface. A cloak of calm settled over him. He dared not examine what lay beneath. Meren nodded to his sister.

"Very well. Now you listen to me, Idut. Get rid of all these-these guests."

"I can't… the feast!"

"After the feast. Lie, Idut. Tell them the servants have a plague."

"Oh, Meren."

"Do it, or I will, and I know you won't like how I manage the task."

"I don't know why you have to be so discourteous."

"And I don't know why you insist upon ignoring the evilmindedness of most of the people you've invited. Now where is this Nu?"

"He's probably still in the steward's office."

He went quietly. Passing out of the gate, he walked quickly to the modest house that lay a few yards to the south. Commanding silence from the porter and servants, he slipped into the room that served as Kasa's office. Neither the steward nor his sons were there.

He was about to leave when he heard the scrape of a rush pen. Through an open door lay a porch on which were stacked sheets of papyrus anchored by smoothing stones. Meren walked outside. Leaning against a column, head bent over a sheet of papyrus stretched across his crossed legs, a youth dipped his pen in black ink and resumed writing.

"You're Nu."

The pen jerked. A wide slash of black disfigured the neat script. The boy looked up, eyes on fire with rage. Then he realized who was standing there. He dropped the pen and paper and scrambled to his feet to bow deeply with raised hands.

Ignoring the boy's discomfort, Meren asked, "Are you?"

"Aye, lord. I am Nu, grandson of Herya, apprentice to master Kasa."

Meren turned his back on the youth. He hadn't thought about what Nu would look like. He wasn't pleased. A scrawny student with a squint, that's what he would have preferred. Nu wasn't scrawny; his eyes were large and sad, and he looked as if he belonged in a chariot facing a Hittite army. This menace needed curbing without delay.

Meren turned around and walked toward the boy. "Nu, you're a fortunate lad."

"My lord?"

Nu backed up and hit the column with the back of his head. Meren stopped within arm's reach, studying his quarry in silence until Nu swallowed and lowered his gaze to the floor.

"Look at me."

Nu lifted his eyes to meet Meren's, and they widened as Meren smiled at him.

"Yes, you're a fortunate lad, Nu. Most men would have killed you for interfering with their daughters." He paused upon hearing a choking sound from Nu. "I, however, am not a hot-bellied man. I ask for explanations before I kill. Explain, Nu."

Nu's mouth worked, but nothing came out of it.

"I can't hear you, boy."

"I, I, I…"

The slap of sandals on the packed-earth floor saved Nu for the moment. Meren turned to find Bener rushing out of the house, breathless and wild-eyed.

"What are you doing here?" Meren snapped.

"A message, Father." She thrust a folded and sealed packet at him.

Meren snatched it from her, glaring. He was about to order her home when his eye caught the inscription on the letter: Kysen. He opened it and read swiftly.

"Everlasting damnation. Fiends of the netherworld!"

Nu scuttled behind the column while Bener gawked at him.

Meren rounded on her and pointed. "Go home, daughter."

"But Father, Nu is only an apprentice. Aunt has imagined things. And she's only trying to distract you because you're angry with her."

"Go, at once!"

Bener vanished, and he turned on Nu. "Come out of there, you worthless little sneak."

Nu stumbled from behind the column and sank to his knees. Touching his forehead to the floor, he waited in silence. Meren touched the sheath that housed his dagger, but the cold metal didn't spur him to action. It brought him back from the brink of violence. Reason returned. He knew his daughter, and she'd been telling him the truth. Most of it.

"As I said, you're a fortunate lad. My daughter's word is as the word of the goddess Maat, lighter than the feather of truth. You may go."

Nu rose and slunk past him, only to start when Meren lifted a hand.

"This isn't the end of our conversation."

"Yes, my lord."

Nu scurried away, leaving Meren alone on the porch staring into the distance. Worry over his daughter warred with a new concern. Kysen was coming. No doubt he'd arrive before Meren could rid himself of this infestation of relatives. Nento would be with him. Both were ostensibly traveling with the trading flotilla for convenience. No one would think it odd that Kysen had invited Nento to break his journey at his father's house.

But curiosity had always been a family trait. All Meren could do was pray to all the gods of Egypt that his unique preparations would be enough protection against the invasion his sister had arranged for the feast of rejoicing. But prayers wouldn't be sufficient.

He would send Reia and his men out to patrol the countryside. Lord Paser's ship had sailed past him this afternoon again. Paser could have moored farther south and even now be lurking about, spying. But he was more worried about others. The powerful priests of Amun had vowed a truce in their relentless and secret warfare against the boy king Tutankhamun.

Meren wasn't sure their promise extended to the heretic king who tried to banish Amun and the other gods from Egypt. Akhenaten, Tutankhamun's brother, had denuded the fabulous temple of Amun, wiped out his name, beggared his priests. These acts had made Akhenaten's very name anathema. And there were those among the restored priesthood who would give their lives if they could destroy Akhenaten's body and thus deprive him of the afterlife. Ultimate vengeance. A vengeance that Meren had sworn to the king he would prevent.

Unfortunately, he'd experienced the cruelty of which Akhenaten had been capable. His own cousin Ebana had suffered a far worse fate. Determined to wipe out any potentially powerful enemies of his heresy, Akhenaten had ordered Ebana assassinated. Ebana had escaped, but his wife and son hadn't. To Meren's dismay, his cousin had blamed him for not preventing the attack, and nothing he said had ever changed Ebana's attitude. Ebana currently served the high priest of Amun in opposition to pharaoh, while an incongruous twist of Meren's fate had put him in the position of protecting the body of the man who had killed his father and nearly brought about his own death.

He folded Kysen's letter and smiled. If he didn't love the king as a son, would he be fighting so hard for Akhenaten's life in the netherworld? A difficult question, and one to which he wasn't sure he wanted the answer.

Before dawn on the third morning after confronting the apprentice scribe, Meren slipped out of the house with a tray bearing food, wine, and an alabaster lamp. He walked swiftly down the avenue between the reflection pools to the small chapel where lay shrines to the gods and to his ancestors. A flight of steps took him to the entrance, which was flanked by two painted columns. Shoving open the carved doors with one hand, he entered.